Pain connects us, love tears us apart
by JessicaDwyer
Summary: Spoilery so please just read the disclaimer. Here's the gist of it: Rorshach and a woman that no one knew about. That is until Doctor Manhattan saw her behind Walter Kovacs pleading eyes. That's all I can say, so let me know if you like it. Everyones here
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer/Author's Note: I own none of these characters except for the as yet unnamed gal who's doing the talking in this chapter.**

**So…I can't get this dude out of my head. I loved the character before but Jackie Earle Haley has just created such an amazing thing with his performance I can't not do something about it. So I just started writing last night. I've never written anything Watchmen before and I have no idea where I'm going with this story. **

**Yes, I know…there will be like a million Rorsch and OFC or OMC fics to spring forth from this fandom. But I'm going to write mine anyway cause dammit…he needs some sort of love. And the angst and hardass of the character is just too damn nummy…much like him in a wife beater covered in blood…but I digress. **

**I'm sure the term Mary Sue will show up in your mind. But not every gal who loves a character is a pansy trying to change him into something he's not. I think you'll see from this first chapter she's not your typical girl. I don't think any gal who could deal with Rorshach could ever be. So I make no apologies for her or for the story. It took over my brain and wouldn't leave me alone. I have no idea really where its taking me…but this is a fine start.**

**This fic of course has tons and tons of spoilers. So if you don't want to be spoiled don't read it. Even this first chapter…the first line has the biggest of the comic/film. So DON"T READ IT IF YOU HAVEN'T READ THE COMIC OR SEEN THE FILM. I can't make that any more clear.**

**In closing to this very long disclaimer…let me know what you think and if I should even bother keeping this up. I've got tons of fics I need to keep working on but if this one is well received I'll keep posting it as I go.**

He's gone. The big blue naked smurf came to tell me personally that he'd killed him.

In the middle of so much death and loss, I only cared about him. In the midst of the death and destruction and the obliteration of 15 million people, I only gave a damn about one man. What does that say about me? Knowing him, he'd say I was stupid, or way too much of a bleeding heart. But I could say the same about him I suppose. He wouldn't have liked that. Oh hell no.

Big Blue is trusting me with the truth. After I tried to beat him to death crying and raging, fists thumping against a perfectly sculpted glow in the dark chest and a couple of blows to a hard as granite chin…he let me calm down. He's patient I suppose, he's got all the time in the world. And then he showed me the truth…some sort of mind meld trick he can do. I saw it all, learned it all…and I was shown why he chose to die. That's not the only reason of course…no one knew Walter like I did. Hell, they didn't even know his real name. I'd hoped it would be enough to know that one person gave a shit about him. That the thought would be enough to keep him wanting to live. But I think what happened pushed him beyond what limits he had left.

And I can't blame him for that…I can only miss him more because of it. And wish I had the chance to beat the living shit out of his mother, the start of it all.

Manhattan apparently got a peek into Rorshach's head before splattering him across the clean white snow of the Antarctic, and in that view…in those last few moments he caught a glimpse of me. I guess it's true what they say…your life does flash in front of your eyes. Glow boy told me that his thoughts stayed on me until there was nothing left on this plane of Walter Kovacs anymore. I guess he thought that would make it easier for me, to know that little tidbit. Men just don't get it I suppose, even ones who are supposedly gods.

It was hard for me to breathe at that point. Harder still knowing I couldn't kill this guy who was telling me in the smoothest voice I'd ever heard how I couldn't tell anyone what I was about to be told and the reason why the only man I'd ever really loved had chosen to die. Somewhere in the back of my head, in that analytical part that wasn't tied up with the crying and pain, I compared the sound of Doctor Manhattan's emotionless dulcet tones to those of Rorshach when he'd talk. Rough, low, nearly a whisper, but you'd always know what he was saying. His voice conveyed all the emotion his face wouldn't allow you to see. There was no doubt he was human…none at all. Manhattan might as well have been a god damn robot.

I guess he never told his "friends" about me. Which is why Manhattan was so curious…when you're nigh on godlike it's a novelty to be surprised it would seem. So he'd gone to the little hovel of a home that Rorshach had stayed at during the times he did sleep and had found a stack of journals. He brought the one with him that talked about me. I'd glared at him through reddened eyes when he'd passed it over, having no doubt he'd read them all…and feeling violated for the man who'd written them.

"I thought you might want to keep this, perhaps even read it when you are able." The blue murderer had said softly, handing me the leather bound volume.

I'd held it close to my chest, and tried to hold back a fresh round of tears. He'd not be happy with me if he'd seen my reaction to his being dead. But fuck him…he wasn't around to berate me about it anymore was he?

Before he left Manhattan once again made me promise not to share the secret of what Veidt had done, and what Rorshach had died for. Once he'd puffed out of existence I smiled and shook my head at the stupidity of this idea of silence. I wouldn't share my knowledge…there was no point really. Rorshach had told me long ago that the truth always wins out eventually. It always finds a way to make itself known. And so I would trust this philosophy.

All these memories are swirling around in my head…all those times and places. They seem so meaningless now. I wonder if he knew exactly how much I did care…god, how much I actually loved him. I wonder if it would have mattered. What I had seen in my minds eye it probably wouldn't have. A man can only take so much before he breaks…and he was already so shattered.

He was like glass, hard and sharp…deadly…but still in pieces. And knowing him like I did…the knowledge of what had taken place and seeing these people he trusted decide to not tell the truth of such a horror. It would be the final straw.

It was an escape for him. He'd get to be free of the pain that had been a part of him for so long. For a moment I hate him for that, for giving up and leaving here alone to deal with all of this. He found a way out…and maybe I should too. I think about that for a moment. I consider it and then decide no. The thought of his anger if I even considered it keeps me from dumping the entire bottle of sleeping pills in my bathroom down my throat.

I laugh at that and bite back the hysterics. He can't tell me anything anymore. He can't argue with me, he can't yell or pop out of a dark corner and scare me half to death. He can't rant about how the darkness in the city is seeping into every person's soul and eating it away. Because he's gone, and I'm alone to deal with that same darkness, no shining white mask to help light my way.

I manage to pick myself up off the ratty couch of my equally ratty apartment and collapse on my bed in the tiny bedroom with the rickety fire escape that he'd always use instead of the front door. I'm still holding onto the journal, like a lifeline because it's the only real thing I have that proves he was here. I wonder why I had to be out of the blast range of the explosion…why I couldn't have been one of the people obliterated.

"It hurts…" I say aloud, to the darkness, to no one. And more damned tears fall again. My eyes are tired from crying, I'm exhausted and I don't have the strength to fight the sleep that is tugging at me. I don't want to sleep…the dreams won't be pleasant…they almost never are…and the images in my head will make sure they aren't. But I'm too weak and so my eyes blink closed slowly.

As they fall at last I think for a moment I see the shining white of a mask reflected in the darkened corner. And then the black of sleep takes everything away.


	2. Chapter 2

**DISCLAIMER: If you've read chapter 1 you know everything that I don't own. Now I've actually written some Rosch in this one. And let me tell you…spell check is FUN with all the damn sentence fragments writing him causes.  But he's worth it.**

**As always, let me know what you think. This is fun to write and I think I'm figuring this gal out. She's letting me into her brain and it's a lovely dark place to be. BTW I'm basing this in movieland if you haven't guessed. If time frames are loopy I apologize. But Rorschach (that's the spelling I'm going with from here on out) is at this point no longer a partner of Nite Owl. Just a little time frame clarification.**

I'm awake and its morning outside. Manhattan survives as though the big gaping hole that has Veidt Enterprises written all over it doesn't even exist. No dreams surprisingly, but I feel like someone has beaten me with a 2x4, and I speak from experience.

I don't have a job to go to right now since the department store was smack in the path of the energy bomb. I lay in bed and through sticky matted eyes stare out the window at a sky that's a mocking shade of blue. My arm that was trying to shield me from the glare falls uselessly to my side and hits the top of the journal next to me. Everything that has happened is real it seems, and that realization hits me once again with the ferocity of a sucker punch to the stomach.

With a groan I sit up and take a deep breath that comes out in a hacking cough. On shaky legs I make my way to the bathroom and shower in water so hot it scalds me, but I don't care. That pain helps me not to dwell on the rest. It distracts me from it, at least for a while. When I step out, my skin is an angry pink. I toss on an old Rolling Stones t-shirt that has seen far better days and some Levi's that have only a few blood stains on the knees.

I need coffee and so I make some instant and put enough sugar in it to make it drinkable. I stare at the journal over my mug of caffeine. It seems to stare back and I remember my hallucination of the night before, of seeing a mask looking out at me from the shadows. I pick it up, nearly afraid to touch it.

I don't want to do this…I don't want to remember. "This will only make things worse you fucking moron." I tell myself aloud, putting down my cup of brown sludge that is pretending to be coffee. I hold the journal to my face and feel tears prick my eyes. It even smells like him. Leather, sweat, that cheap aftershave he sometimes used, I can even smell the tang of blood…might even be some of his. Some people couldn't stand that aftershave. I often wondered where the hell he got it from. But I actually liked it, after a while. It was a part of the whole package I suppose. He didn't really waste time on things like that.

Letting out a heavy sigh I sit down with a thud on the floor, my back resting against the bed. With shaking fingers I open the cover and start reading. The first couple of entries are typical reports and musings of his patrols. I can almost hear his rasping voice reciting the words on the page. It's oddly beautiful prose about the disintegration of society and in particular the city I'm in. But it's the third entry that makes my mouth go dry.

_10/1/1982_

_Night was strange. Saw girl running into alleyway with two men. They chased her, I followed. Before I could make it to the entrance, shots fired. Two. I turn the corner and she stands there holding gun, smoke trailing up from the barrel. She's smiling. _

_Men are dead, gun is one of theirs I know. Recognize them. Gang, not sure which one though. I watch her. She takes gun and wipes it on her shirt. Then shoves it into hand of one of the men. _

_She looks around, doesn't see me. I've learned how to stay hidden well. She kicks the body of the other man. I see the hate in her eyes. She's wearing tennis shoes that are black. All of her clothes are black. She's learned how to hide too. But she's wearing glasses. Not smart. Daniel had goggles. Not much better, but improvement. She's young. Maybe 27. Maybe younger. Can't tell for sure. Annoying. Don't like not knowing things. Guessing never good. _

_She takes something from her pocket. Coat is long, black leather. Bottle of something. She pours it on the men. I smell it. Lighter fluid. Puts the bottle back in pocket. Pulls out matches next. Lights with her thumb and tosses it. I see the flames arching through the dark, reflect in her glasses. She looks like a demon. Maybe angel. Maybe both. _

_Fire starts fast. Consumes clothes, flesh, hair, everything. I watch her watching it. She's smiling again, but not happy. I see something else. Tears. She cries. Don't know why…I don't like not knowing. I hear a scream behind me. I turn to see old woman with a dog…poodle…she sees the bodies on fire. _

_I slip into the shadows, turn back to see the girl. She's gone. I make way up the fire escape of building and watch as cops arrive. Useless. Inept. Corrupt. The find nothing but what she wants them to. Just the bodies. They don't know anything. Just get by. Less work the better. They don't care._

_I don't like not knowing things._

I close the journal unable to keep reading and feel a breeze tickle my ear carrying the scent of leather and blood. I actually feel myself smile just a bit.


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer/Author Note: You've read part one by now, you know I own nothing but my girl and a little statue of Rorschach. **

**I wanted to get this brief chappie up because my gal has started sharing a bit of her past with me. And now I get to share it with you. She even gets a name (sort of) in this entry. **

**Just so you know, the point of view is going to change eventually. It's not going to be all from her perspective the whole story…because that would get boring. And I like trying my hand at our beloved ginger headed sociopath so a few more of his journal entries will be showing up I'm sure. But there will be third person too. Rather like the graphic novel in that respect I suppose. But anyway…here's a short chapter for you. **

**Also, thank you for all the reviews! They are love and always make me happy. Rorschy shaped chocolates for you all. **

Memories are a form of torture. I'm a firm believer in this. They are also great motivation, a way of honing you from the inside out to do what must be done. That's part of what shaped me, and I know that's what shaped Walter Kovacs into the entity he became.

The journal has stirred those memories as I knew it would. I can almost feel the heat from the fire as it cooked the remains of the murderers who'd found themselves on the other side of the gun for the first and last time. Seeing through Rorschach's eyes what I appeared to be is enlightening. I'd not even noticed he was there.

The train of thought brings me back to what started this all for me. The reason I became this demonic angel as he described. Fallen Angel would be the name he dubbed me with later, although I never saw it myself. I've never looked very angelic, and acted even less so in the last few years. Irony I suppose. Or maybe he thought I was the devil incarnate. The thought makes me laugh. I wouldn't be surprised by it at all. He'd cursed me enough the times I irritated him. But with a flush of warmth I remember other times, foul language was involved but it was spoken with near reverence.

I shake my head free of that train of thought. No, I won't go down that road…not now. I'm on the edge enough and that would just send me over. I focus back on what led me to where I am, to who I became. I wonder what my sister would have thought of her younger sibling fighting alongside one of the most feared Masks to stalk the city? Would she understand the things I did in her name? I don't know if she would, but he did. He understood that burning need to avenge something so awful that not to would have left you to rot slowly from the inside out.

Still holding the journal I stand stiffly and walk to stare at the only real photograph I have in my apartment. There are newspaper clippings on the walls of course, badges of honor…but this is the only real evidence I have a past or at one time a family. Two girls, one a couple of years older than the other look back at me. The younger one serious, but still smiling. The older one is far prettier, and beaming. She's holding an acceptance letter to NYU.

My sister was the only family I had left. I was just turning 18 when she got accepted to college. She had waited to enroll to take care of me when our parents died in a car crash. Drunk driver, who of course came away without a scratch.

After I promised her I'd be alright on my own and she needed to follow her dream of attending school in the Big Apple, she took the opportunity. Yes, it was hard, and yes I felt the slightest bit of resentment. But I was only human. She left and I moved in with a family friend trying to figure out my own life and working a piss ant job in our small town. Michele wrote every other day about her classes and life in the city. She even started talking about getting me to move out there with her.

Two years passed then three and I saw her at Christmas time every December. I was still no closer to figuring out what I wanted to do with my life when it happened. One day the letters stopped coming.


	4. Chapter 4

**DISCLAIMER/AUTHORS NOTE: I do own Rorschach…at least the two little figures that are sitting on my shelf. As for the rest…well you already know the routine.**

**So here's the new entry. This one gives us a lot more background about Rorschach's Fallen Angel (which someone else used this name after I did for their character…please don't get this confused with their story…that's just her Mask name in this…I'll get to her real name soon). Anyway…More background and we get another Rorschach journal entry at the end just for fun and a bit o insight. After this chapter I believe I'm going to switch the format, so just be aware that this first person perspective is going to go away soon. **

**Also, thank you to all who've favorited this story and reviewed. I'm glad you like it. I'm writing this for me and for you all who love these characters. **

I knew something was wrong. But I had no idea what it was. I just knew my sister hadn't sent me a letter in nearly a month, nor had she called. Being without an actual phone she'd use a payphone down the street from the closet she called an apartment when she had the ability and the extra cash laying around for the call. It wasn't often of course.

I had no idea of how to get in contact with her. She was just…gone. I tried contacting the local police who in turn contacted the NYPD. Of course they were useless. One young woman in the entirety of Manhattan? What the hell did that matter?

And so another month passed. I was growing more and more angry with the situation and a lot of that anger focused on the legal system and the fact it wasn't working or on my side again. The drunk had walked after an appeal got him a suspended sentence and his license revoked. My parents had been rotting in the ground for less than a month before he was free. And now my sister wasn't worth searching for in the eyes of the law.

My grip tightened on the leather bound book as I remembered the day I got the call. Not from Michele…but from a detective at a station in lower Manhattan. They'd found my phone number in Michele's apartment and had figured out from her effects that I was her sister. They needed a family member to identify the body.

I feel the tears prick my eyes again at the memory. Not of sadness…I was well over that now. No, this was fury that still burned inside of me. Walter had understood the bullshit that was rampant in the city. He understood that it was too much for the police to handle. That they had become bloated and corrupt in their own right. No, it took more than they could offer to fight the evil that had taken over this city….and all the others like it.

I didn't cry when I realized what the man on the phone was telling me. Shock of some kind, I'm not sure. I told him it would take me a couple of days to get there, I remember that. Those two days were spent getting train tickets and packing. I had nothing in the town of my birth left for me. My job meant nothing, I didn't even bother telling my boss I quit. I had no plans other than getting to NY and seeing my sister's body and finding out what happened. After that I had no clue.

The train ride to the city had been loud and crowded. I didn't sleep, my mind churning with the knowledge that someone had taken the only family I had left from me. Anger started to build within me, white hot and nearly a physical thing within my chest. And I still hadn't cried.

I had one back pack and one small duffle bag with me when I got off the train. I found the cheapest motel I could. The room was filthy but I wasn't picky. I remember the man at the front desk said something suggestive and then he took a look at my eyes. What he saw there must have caused the boner in his sweatpants to wilt. The man never said another word to me after that. And it was just as well for him.

The morgue was cold. The whole fucking city was cold. But I remembered the day was colder than any I'd ever felt when I headed down the long corridor to the room where my sister waited for me on a slab. The detective…his name was Murphy...was trying in his own half ass way to be sympathetic. I think I made him nervous on retrospect. I had that effect on people. I still do.

I reach out and touch the photograph. Michele's face blurs and I see her as I did that day…skin a mottled near grey. Both of her eyes blackened, lips flaking and bloody. There's a gash on the side of her head, burn marks crisscross her chest and I can see their shadows beneath the thin white sheet where they continue over her breasts and lower. They look like something from a cigar tip.

I hear Detective Murphy's voice again asking me in a near whisper if that's Michele Burton. I'm studying her face as he asks this, memorizing everything…every cut and bruise. I still see them when I think about her. I can close my eyes and see my sister's body in perfect detail down to the rip in her earlobes where someone had torn out the silver hoops she always wore.

Of course it was her, no matter how much I wanted it not to be. I told him the one word answer of "Yes." And then I turned and walked out of the room.

I had her cremated as there was really no reason for a funeral. I was the only family she had. I took her ashes with me in a plain white urn and sat them on the small gaudy yellow table in my hotel room. The police had no leads just some suspicions. I had nothing at all, but a plain white jar filled with dust.

For two days I simply stayed in my room and stared out at the city that had murdered her. No one called for me. No one check to see if I was okay. I had asked the police what they "thought" had happened. What they said was there was a gang, possibly with Russian ties, that had a business involving young women they kidnapped and selling the rights to "have fun" with them to the highest bidder. The influx of young fresh faced girls who didn't know what they were walking into was endless. They were easy pickings. This had all the signs of one of those. But proving it and finding out who actually did it…that was the ongoing battle.

That was the last time I talked to Detective Murphy. The third day I walked out of my hotel room to the rundown gym a block away. The old guys who worked out there and even the young ones looked at me like I was nuts. I was a woman for one, and I wore glasses for another. When I told them what I wanted to learn they laughed…at least until I decked the closest one next to me with a right hook that made him stagger back and nearly fall over.

I was stronger than I looked thanks to my old job. I'd had an overnight stock position at the local grocery store. Unloading pallets of frozen turkeys could have been a routine added to Gold's Gym any day of the week. After that they must have seen something that made them take me seriously. They didn't laugh again.

I started boxing and training everyday. I got a job in the stockroom of a department store, working nights unloading pallets of clothes and make-up now…no more turkeys…but just as heavy.

I laugh at the memory of the guys who I worked with. The innuendos and the jokes….they weren't any different than the guys from my hometown….just a bit harder around the edges. Nothing they say could shock me, and I blended in…just another schlub in a weight belt moving boxes and getting paid shit.

I turn and glare at the newspaper that's sitting on my counter. Adrian Veidt's smug face is staring back at me. I feel that anger burning in my chest again roaring to life. They are all dead now. Part of Veidt's sacrifice for a perfect world. Like Rorschach, all bodies that build the bridge to Utopia. The urge to beat Veidt's pretty face in makes me nearly scream. I want him to hurt like I do. I want him to pay.

I hear Rorschach's rough voice in my head "No matter how you cover it up, the true face shows through. You just have to look. You'll see it." I stare into Veidt's eyes in the photograph. I see the blackness there and I wonder if anyone else does.

"Adrian Veidt…" I say his name aloud, the name of the man who destroyed the lives of so many in the name of peace. The name of the man who cost me the one person who mattered...that I had left. The name that I am forced to see everywhere I look outside of these four walls. "I see the real you." I tell the darkness within and without.

_Rorschach's Journal_

_12/15/1982_

_Impressive. Learns fast. Patrolled Chinatown and ran into Jade Dragon Triad's roughing up man and his wife. Four of them in total. F.A. didn't hesitate. I watched, let her learn, see what she's capable of. _

_Took down two of the scum, third pulled a knife and managed to stab her in arm…Was surprised when he saw me, especially when head was turned front to back. Neck snapped loudly. Comforting sound. _

_Pulled knife out. F.A. winced but didn't scream. No tears. Respect that. Not typical. Fourth thug was running away. Scared. Threw knife and caught him in hamstring. Fell hard. Nice sound. _

_Man and wife were gone when looked up from questioning him. F.A. kept knife as souvenir. Said it would help her remember to be more careful as she wiped blood of thug off blade. Respect that. _

_No tears when I stitched up wound. Not typical. _


End file.
